And the Lack of a Name
by The Black Sun's Daughter
Summary: Eve has only one Word, one soulmate, and he's undoubtedly the most frustrating person ever. She hasn't even met him yet. (Soulmates AU)


Eve's Word appears on her wrist when she's six. It says _Kiddo_ , in a scratchy, jagged writing that's nothing like her handwriting, which she labors to make neat and legible, including her cursive.

She knows that it has to be a nickname. Her father calls her 'Cadet' all the time, uses the rank like a term of endearment. She wonders if that is what her soulmate has on his wrist.

 _Kiddo_ is nice, but she wants to know his name.

* * *

When Eve is enrolled in military school, just like all her family is supposed to be, her Word changes for the first time, and it becomes _Student_ instead.

And it stays that way, too. Even after she graduates and joins the actual military, it remains _Student._ She works her way up through the ranks to Colonel, and it is still _Student._ She frowns a little at her wrist sometimes, because nobody can be in school forever, right?

Either he's an idiot that can't pass a single damn class, or he's a genius that doesn't want to do anything but learn.

* * *

Before she joins Counterterrorism in NATO, her Word changes a second time. It becomes _Librarian._ And it stays that way for ten years.

* * *

The Library is lost.

Flynn goes to find it, and she lets him. She knows that she is his soulmate; he's shown her his own Word, bashfully: _Guardian,_ inked in her own looping cursive handwriting on his wrist. But that does not mean they are to be bound together like iron. Iron shatters under stress.

Eve lets him go, because she knows that he'll be back. He loves her, but he loves the Library too. She is his heart, the Library is his home.

She has her hands full, anyways, wrangling three newly-named Librarians-in-Training, proving to Flynn that he is not alone anymore, that he is no longer _the_ Librarian, the weight of all that magic is no longer solely upon _his_ shoulders.

Doesn't mean she never misses him, though, and frets over his safety since she knows that he won't do it himself.

* * *

Her three charges are strange creatures.

They bicker and fight and argue, but it is all done in fondness, like it's a substitute for flirting or perhaps _is_ their flirting, and there is a _way_ to how they move around each other, almost like a dance.

It reminds her of the way she and Flynn interact, almost strangers yet following the same steps like they've done so for years.

She asks Jenkins if there is such a thing as three-way soulbonds.

He smiles and never answers.

* * *

The Library is found.

She dies to bring it back, but it brings her back in turn. Sometimes magic is so much more trouble than it is worth, but sometimes, it is just _awesome._ Especially when it's bring-Eve-back-to-life magic.

Flynn comes home with too, sees how the others have grown, become Librarians in their own right, and some of the tension eases out of his shoulders.

On her wrist, _Librarian_ begins to fade, and _Flynn_ becomes darker underneath it.

* * *

Stone, Cassandra, and Jones drift apart, and she aches to see them go even though she knows they need it, need to be themselves, find their feet. They all need to know that they can do this job on their own, without her and without each other, or a part of them will always wonder.

She misses them but reminds herself that it's not permanent. They are all planets to the Library's star, sometimes orbiting far away, but never really gone.

Give it time, and the heavens align on their own. She and Flynn are already there, so they can't be far behind.

* * *

The Library is broken.

She and Flynn disagree, and again, their paths diverge.

Usually by now, Eve would have called it quits and given up, but she doesn't. She never will.

Because even if he takes a different path, it always winds back to merge with hers. Just like the other Librarians, they will always drift apart only to come back together, ties too strong to be broken and too delicate to be seen.

He is _hers,_ and in that same stretch, she is his, too.

She finds herself tracing her Word more and more.

* * *

Her charges usually arrive together in the mornings, and Eve no longer wonders.

It's taken them long enough, and when she first catches them sitting together, Stone reading as Jones dozes in his lap and Cassandra leans against his other side to read with him, she almost wants to throw her hands up and say, "Finally!"

When Flynn appears in another sporadic visit, he is puzzled at first, knowing that something has changed but not knowing _what,_ and it makes her smile.

* * *

The Library is fixed.

Flynn is home, and she feels relief great enough to make her lightheaded a moment. He is there to stay, for now, walking the same path as she is.

They track down artifacts and magic, but with four Librarians to split the work between, it leaves them with time. Time for them.

A date in Sicily after exploring ruins in Ecuador. Lunch on the Seine after recovering scrolls from Libya. It is thrilling and insane, and she will never trade it for anything in the world, walking through the streets of cities and countries she believed that she would never have the means to visit in her lifetime.

Of course, Flynn will inevitably get distracted and begin to yammer about culture and historical events and things so esoteric it's almost amusing until she shuts him up with a kiss.

He gets distracted easily on these walks they take, and he doesn't shut up even when she wrestles him into a bed. She makes it a game, seeing how many different languages she can get him to babble in before he's putty in her hands.

Her record is twelve.

* * *

Eve turns her wrist over, taking off her watch so she can admire _Flynn,_ her one and only Word standing out neatly against her skin.

She tells him how it was only _Librarian_ for a very long time, and he asks why that was a bad thing.

He doesn't understand.

She has Librarians. Matter of fact, she has three of them. But there is and will only ever be one Flynn.


End file.
